So after a delightful expirence coming out to my mother, I informed her I was furry. Long story way short, I have made her more accepting of the fandom, because she used to only believe the CSI episode.

So monday she asks me what it is I wanted for my birthday. I hadn't really given much though as to what I want vs. need. Any game that has come otu I have purchased with my money, and I have also found a lack of time for playing video games so the usual whatever video game was quickly thrown out. From expirence, I know that my parent's suck at buying my trading cards, plus mycurrent situation doesn't give me much competition besides when I could just have my mate give me the cards.

So I came up with two things I really wanted.

A new roomate, which sadly she has no control over. And a fursuit. I had recently put off my dreams of owning my own character until after I had settled down and gotten a stable income from teaching.

Well my mother sews for a living, and she offered to help me build my fursona into a character.

So now why im posting. I have found som construction photos from jax the bats website, however, these do not include a how to. I am researching how to build a fursuit out of blacava and foam(the way jax does it) because this produces a moving jaw which I really want.

I was wondering if anybody else has stumbled upon a great resource for building fursuit characters.

I know other people have it worse, but that doesn't mean I can't be angry about stuff all the same.

Putting this up here mostly because I can't talk about it with my family, as some people know I've recently done some damage to my leg, for obvious reasons I've been a bit pissed/depressed about it, yet every time I try to talk about it everyone says the same thing,

'Some of the horror stories I've heard about this stuff, you're lucky you've done so well.'

Yeah I know, other people with the same problem can't walk or work their legs half as good as me, BUT THAT DOESN'T MEAN I CAN'T BE PISSED ABOUT IT! Somebody is always gonna be worse off than someone else, that's just life, just because their problems are worse doesn't make mine better. I hate it, it's like I'm not allowed to be angry about it which just sucks.

And odds are I'm going to have to have surgery on my leg, which freaks me out, yes I admit I am absolutely terrified about the thought of having to go into surgery, but if I mention that it's always the same thing, 'Well this person's had to have a bunch of surgeries' or 'this isn't going to be half as bad as your other surgery'

I just want to complain about it, that's how I cope, something pisses me off I complain about it for a few hours or a day tops and then I deal with it. I'm really glad I have this place, at least here I know I can rant to people without them berating me for it.

When I heard the first single, “Re-Education (Through Labor),” on the radio, I thought I would be disappointed with “Appeal to Reason.” When you consider how amazing “The Sufferer and the Witness” was, it would be almost impossible for Rise Against to top it in the next album, and they don’t here. In fact, in terms of quantity of standout tracks, this could very well be their worst album since “The Unraveling,” but an album disappointing for Rise Against is still better than what just about any other punk band can put out.

1. Collapse (Post-Amerika) 10/10: Let’s just call the song “Collapse,” makes more sense considering the chorus, and it isn’t misspelled. It’s one of the better songs on the album, a really strong opener. The chorus is especially heavy and catchy.
2. Long Forgotten Sons 6/10: This has got to be the most forgettable #2 track of any Rise Against album, but it’s still not technically a bad song.
3. Re-Education (Through Labor) 7/10: I like the energy of this first single, the structure too, but the lyrics are subpar for Rise Against, absolutely loaded with clichés and with a message so vague that it makes no point at all.
4. The Dirt Whispered 6/10: This song reminds me a lot of “Under the Knife” from the last album, more of a mid-tempo song than an all-out rocker. It works very well as a change of pace. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think the lyrics work very well on this one either.
5. Kotov Syndrome 6/10: This song has a rather simple and catchy chorus, which helps to make it one of the initial favorites, but I also think it’s one of those songs that will get worse with repeated listens due to its simplicity. In fact, I’m on the third listen, and I already like it less.
6. From Heads Unworthy 6/10: Now just the opposite: a complex song with minimal initial catchiness. The song would seem to be about the purpose of the band being to sway the audience to be proactive, a personal song in that sense.
7. The Strength to Go On 8/10: While not a spectacular song, this one has pretty good lyrics, energy, catchiness, and a little vocal trick on “On.” Actually, that part gets kind of annoying.
8. Audience of One 9/10: On the last album, the slower songs were terrible and felt added just to have something in the same vein as “Swing Life Away.” This time, the slower songs are some of the best ones on the album, including “Audience of One” here. It’s a coming of age song, and it seems very sincere and personal, and though slow, it’s not pop-punkish.
9. Entertainment 7/10: The song starts off very well, but the chorus is pretty dumb, and the carousel music in the bridge sounds very tacky.
10. Hero of War 10+/10: This is easily the best acoustic track Rise Against has done, and it might just be the best song of the year by any band. I saw them live a few weeks ago, and I heard it the first time live. They threatened to close with it, didn’t, but it could make a great closer at some point in their tours. When this one hits the radio, it’s going to be huge.
11. Savior 8/10: It’s a catchy song, and it’s refreshingly non-activist oriented, but it comes dangerously close to entering pop-punk territory.
12. Hairline Fracture 7/10: The chorus is kind of a letdown, but the song is still good, complex, and with a lot of potential to grow on you. The harmonies are a nice touch.
13. Whereabouts Unknown 9/10: For the last two albums, the closer was the best song, but that’s not the case here. It’s the vagueness of the imagery and the message that really hurts it, just like a lot of the album, but other than that, a lot of neat shifts, catchiness, the telegraph noises in the background, the hardcore screams… a lot to love about this song.
14. Historia Calamitatum 7/10 *Import Bonus Track*: I think it’s literally about natural disasters and rebuilding from them, but like most of the album, it’s hard to tell. It could be about the “floods” of drinking, like “Dancing for Rain,” but that might be a stretch. Honestly, it’s probably not worth buying the import for this song, but it’s not bad, and I’m glad I got it.

Overall, this is one of the best albums of the year, musically, vocally, and lyrically impressive, but still, not the best Rise Against has done. The lyrics are too vague and cliché on too many songs, and the melodies aren’t as catchy or memorable as the ones on their previous albums. The biggest kudos go to how solid this album is (as you can see by my rankings, not really a bad song on it), and of course, how very special “Hero of War” is.

RYAN CRUEY, who has turned 16!!

Happy birthday Ry! We don't exactly know each other well and your posts make a cloud of depression loom over me and makes me cut myself but you're awesome and it's your BIRTHDAY!!

*breathes*

I got you this here *checks pockets* uhm, how are you with Pokemon Cards? AND FIFTY LAYERED CAKES THE SIZE OF THE LEANING TOWER OF PISA!?

Loki: That IS the Leaning Tower of Pisa you inbred little-testicled midget ugly, ugly girl.

Ray: ...Well turn it into cake cuz its RYAN CRUEY'S BIRTHDAY!!

But it has to mean something, right? Well, maybe not, but I still feel like saying something to make this one post count a bit more than others of mine.

Ahem, it's true that post count isn't such a big deal anymore with people racking posts so fast in the SPAM and Game sections, but the jump between the thread I did more than a year ago (I think) with my first 10k and this one now means some time has passed, new faces have been met, old faces have stayed and some others have unfortunately left. I still feel that DaD's my second home though, and with a modest age of almost three years here (Compared to the other people I know from way before), I think I'll stay 'round for another three, heh heh. Sorry ;D

And now, a few words about people I consider cool and deserve mentions in this topic:

Shadow: Many good memories you and I have, from either purposedly causing an apocalypse nobody would be able to stop, to simple random Fox illegal copyrighting. People simply can't stop us, can they? Or maybe they don't want to, but the thing is! We're a cool duo, and you're still the god of SPAM and humor here!

Lily: Never thought I'd meet someone so lovely in a forum board, and I mean it. First thing I know you're a good artist, next you're hugging my legs and don't let go! Well, I think you're cute too, and I'm glad we met, you're funny, and I don't care if you say you got to learn some stuff, there's always a time for every thing, sweet!

Disturbed: Albeit not as frequently on as I'd like him to be, we all know why you haven't been around. You're always funny to hang around with and you rival me in descriptive teasing with female characters. Stay healthy furball!

Kurtz: It's a pity you just don't RP anymore, but it is nice seeing you post every now and then. I'm glad you haven't left the forums and that you're still hanging around. Keep it up!

AWL: You have the natural ability to piss me off, but we share just so many things in common I can hardly keep any hard (No pun intended <_<) feelings against you. And anyways, you play cute orcas and arrogant studs with macro fetishes! Who can possibly dislike you anyways?

Ray: I'm glad you cut the drama early and returned to where you belonged, we had missed you despite everything that had gone down, but anyhow, that's past, and I'm still glad to have you around too. Despite whatever people say at random intervals, never change!

Magus: You Miss, are contradictive and like to show off, but it never comes out the way you want it to sound, too bad! But there's always room for second chances like people like to say : D Cheer up, you've got potential, and you have the fun factor that could be used for very good things!

Crimson: Hey there crazy fox! I'm so glad you joined the MSN RPGing, if at least for a few days! You are a vital part of the SDP that no RPG must faulter to make it be awesome and funnier than it's supposed to be! Never leave, red guy!

Drake: You might not be as frequent as other people, but I know you have a very busy life, and while you and I shared my first DaD macro/growth RPG, I knew that I was destined to embrace my macrophile fetish. You're one of my best buddies and you know how to cheer me up when I really need it. I just hope you'd post more and hang around more!

Lonely Gabu: Well, you come every now and then, so that counts as being here! I'm just glad you are, people need someone to make them reflex some times, and you're the right person to!

Matt Ishida: Still low in profile as always, curse your MSN failures, but at least we can keep in touch via PMs here. Another good reason never to leave the DaD.

Lord Patamon: Hey Pata :3 You've been nothing but a helping hand, and I mean that to everyone now. You Sir, have taken all of the praise and deserved it fully! Maybe some of us are growing too dependant on you to solve our problems, but I for myself really appreciate your goodwill and helpful attitude! Keep it up with PataGato, I'm sure the fandom has a few more years left! rofl

Wolfe: Dude, I miss you, I know you're busy and all the stuff, and that we can chat on MSN, but I really miss your prescence in the boards, I know you're always there though, even though you'd appear randomly. Thanks for all you've done for the DaD and for me, never change!

Big T: From the first day our eyes met, I knew that we would, OOPS! Wrong speech. We haven't even spoken through any sort of video chat yet, but we know each other enough to say we're like equals in the spontaneous-perverted-thought department, and hey! We. Like. Big butts. And ladies just can't help liking it!

Unknown: You still are the one with the most meaningful post count, and I still respect you for all the years you have here. Although I'm sure you are lonely here without Zeph, I kinda miss her too, hope she got my PM before the site crashed though. I'd like to see her back.

Wise: Hai! You still make me laugh with puns I can (or try to) understand! Learning new stuff and words of wisdom from you is always fun and neat, plus you know how to give advice when I need it. Thanks for being around, Wisemon!

cboy/sonrouge/BigD/whoeveryouare: Another one who I like seeing around, maybe you're not a fan of macro, but I'll still remember you were the first one to create an expansion RPG, and that was really cool in my book! You're not afraid of telling people about your fetishes, and that's inspired me to make my fursona in RPGs who I really want him to be! (Physically, since Mentally he's still the same as me [un]fortunately!)

Lost Requiem: Hey thur! Never thought you could be so uhm, what's the word I'm searching for... Funny! No, that's not it. CREATIVE! No, not that either. COOL! Erm, maybe next time. Oh well, no adjetive can fully describe you, but you're a nice person, and you quickly understood to almost never take anything I say seriously : D Good boy. RPing with you is leet!

...And to everybody else who's not receiving a direct mention here, it's not that I don't care, most of you know what I think about everybody here 'cause I'm not one to save things for later use, but I admit I know not about everyone, and I still got to get to know some people better. Thanks for all the laughs and tears, 20k is a lot of spam, but in my case, I compensate in more than one way! ;D Now, let's duke it out in a drinking contest! *Punches a hole in a wall and takes out a huge keg* LET THE GAMES BEGIN!

Your friendly, enormously sexy mountain of blue studly muscles,

Dragon
Master
X

First and foremost, I don't like either candidate, so don't come to me with any BS accusation that I'm saying these things 'cause I want McCain to win. As far as I'm concerned, they're both politicians who can say whatever they want now; what matters is what they actually do once in office. Gone are the days where I make my decision based on whether they have the fourth, ninth, or eighteenth letter of the alphabet in front of their names. Now the rant.


This isn't so much a rant as it is my cynical opinion of the upcoming election. Amazing that I've only been in politics for a little over five years and I'm already about to live through a “damned if we do, damned if we don‘t” election.

If Obama wins, we'll have a rookie (as I refer to him, "a five-year jury member who now thinks he's qualified to be a judge") in office who's grand idea in a recession is to raise taxes (forget his "give 95% a tax cut" BS, which practically screams "I pulled this out of my ass". In any case, five percent of Americans can't pay for all the expensive ideas he has, assuming they don't say "Screw this" and leave) and spend even more money Big Brother doesn't have on things the people don't need. We'll have the democrats in Congress, the White House and the Supreme Court, and anyone who doesn't think they'll try and take advantage of all that power is dreaming (considering all the whining over the 2000 election, I wouldn't be surprised if they try and change the rules). And of course, since there's some unwritten rule that you can't ever bad-mouth an African-American, the likes of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton will probably be throwing the dreaded "R" word left and right at anyone who even looks at Obama wrong. So much for free speech.

And of course, with the economic hardships, paranoia about global warming, terrorism, and all those other wonderful things combined with a lazy populace more interested in fast solutions than Constitutional law, Big Brother might not even have to try and hide their continued grabbing of powers they don’t have. Obama’s already talked about a new national security force where “People of all ages, stations, and skills will be asked to serve (and whenever Big Brother “asks“ something, it‘s generally at gun point). Does anyone really think this is for something that the police, FBI, DEA, ATF, USMS, ICE, and Border Patrol, all of which employ at least several thousand personal, can‘t do. If they are indeed not doing their job, why not try and manage them better rather than creating yet another government-run organization to leech more tax payer dollars?

And of course, if things don’t get better, Bush will get all the blame no matter what Obama does to screw things up. It worked for Hurricane Katrina, so why not do it again? It’s always easier to point fingers rather than accept the blame, because then there’s no burden on you to solve the problem.

And again, I'm not fond of McCain (though I like some of his ideas). In any case, I doubt things will be much better if he wins, especially if Congress doesn't switch hands. For one, the next four years will probably be spent trying to disprove that racism was involved in his victory rather than fixing any of the problems we're facing. If the race card was played when a white candidate lost, it's foolish to believe it won't be played even more if a African-American candidate loses. And that's only the optimistic view of what could happen; the pessimistic view is that we'll see riots in the streets. If African-Americans riot over the "racist acquittal" of four officers who beat someone 99% of them never heard of, what do you think will happen if someone 99% of them know loses an election, especially when he's the first African-American to be in a presidential election? Oh, and a registered democrat at my job who supported Hillary thinks the same thing is likely to occur. Just goes to show you “racist” Republicans aren’t the only ones nervous.

If that doesn’t happen, the next four years will be a repeat of the last, with the democrats in Congress dragging their feet and acting like spoiled brats whose parents won’t buy that toy they want, rather than trying to fix the problems we‘re facing. In 2006, Pelosi claimed they would work with Republicans to make things better. Last I checked, things got worse (of course, Pelosi, who had the arrogance to think that she alone could decide whether we could drill for more oil, was quick to point the finger at Bush when this happened, never mind that Congress has to approve everything Bush wants to do). While I don’t think either party should kiss the other's ass, it would be nice if they could get along for the good of the people they’re supposed to be serving.

I could go on, but I think the general point has been made; tough times are coming for Americans. Time will tell whether they will wake us up to how America should be truly be run or if we’ll continue to accept short-term solutions and finger-pointing from the politicians who continue to grab power they shouldn't have.

Well yet again i have a rant. Yeah yeah same ol rant. Lets start this thing off.

Okay. People speak what they think. But yet again do they chose there words clearly before posting or even speaking? Lets say i call my self the low life trash. I call myself because i dont think i am a higher advantage point to everyone else. But then you have the people that think they are the ones who are a higher level of inteligence just to think they can be the ones to pick on others.I am artistic. I love to do what i do. I only show the wok i wanna like a sig. Or even things on paper. To my friends. Not every little peice of artwork i have to offer. So say i do show something. I dont think highly of myself. But since i do show my own style alot of people will do this.

"Do you think you are better if you can do *so or so*?" Ill answer with this.

"No i dont think i am even a remorce better than you." But then it ends in a horrific nature. Where they wanna start something. There are alot of people in this world. Ass holes or not. But what makes them that? What ever they chose to make people beleive. I beleive i am nothing. I dont care anymore. So why do i care now? Cuz i hate people point and blank. (Well except for my friends. There on my good side.) Hell right now i am joyess as possible. But i like writting what i wanna write. So who are you and what are we? Do you find yourself different?

Another thing i love. I have delt with a lot of misery and whole in my life. Family isnt the good of the pack. But then people who have the same conflict go. "My pain is better than your pain!" I go

"Who cares." You see i do that because i had pain its gone now past is past. I have pain but not much of it anymore. Well people think of this as a stupid rant but ah well.

I'm sick and tired of gamers, when they play and don't make it through or die during gameplay, they always so 'FUCK' 'SHIT' or @#%^!!^&$@! on the console. They include my brother who's a complete idiot and one time I saw some dude play Guitar Hero at a HMV one time and he missed 5 and left the game and said 'FUCK!' like it was his game.

I know it wasn't any of my business, but I am just so ticked at them that they always go like that. I almost wanted to kill that bugger when he just dropped the 360 console with a thudding 'fuck'.

Suprised this hasn't been remade actually. If you're going to be away for more than 3 days post it here so we all know.

Anyway I'm off for about the next week and possibly the weekend after working in a garage, then I've got exams untill the fifth. So I won't be around for a while, I might drop in if I have time.

Last night, I purchased AC/DC's newest album, Black Ice. Despite relatively bad reviews, I decided to give it a shot. I noticed that the music wasn't as fast paced or angry as some of their older works. Just to point it out, Angus Young is, like, 60 years old. He aint Young no more. The demented schoolboy was bound to slow down at some point.

That being said, it was an enjoyable album to listen to. I'm not going to break down the album song by song, like Wisemon does. I'll let him do that. However, I will give you the Highlight Reel.

Track One - Rock N Roll Train: at first, I was disappointed by this track. But, after listening to it a few times, it's grown on me. Its one of those songs, where the more you listen to it, the better it gets.


Track Five - War Machine: in my opinion, the best song on the album. The rolling bassline can be heard, and the lyrics remind me of their younger, angrier days. I listened to this track when I walked to the convience store earlier, and it made me feel like an instant badass. One of my friends and fellow board members here(you know who you are) showed a strong dislike for this song. I guess taste varies. I love this song.

Track Seven - Spoilin' For A Fight: pretty standard AC/DC. A pretty good song about pickin' fights. The guitar is well played, and the pounding bassline isn't overpowering. The solo is pretty good, too. Kinda makes me want to air guitar it.

Track 15 - Black Ice: one of the more fast-paced songs, if you can call it that. Another song that's good for pumping you up. The riffs are enjoyable, and Brian Johnson's howl-like singing makes the song. The solo is a little faster than the others, which I enjoy.


Overall, the album is pretty good. If you expect the old style of AC/DC, with Angus just flat-out wailing on the guitar, you'll be disappointed. That being said, they could have mixed the album a little better. Unless you have your stereo at Wide-Open Throttle, you'll barely hear him.

I rate this CD 6.7/10. A good album, rather enjoyable, but, they're a little too old to kick it like they used to.